If you're manually enrolling students into your course and are unable to locate someone by name and/or student ID, it may be because he/she doesn't yet have an existing Moodle account.

In November, 2011, VCC implemented a system whereby new Moodle accounts were generated automatically with 24 hours of a NEW VCC student registering into a course on BANNER. This process was automated to take place in the wee hours of the morning. So, as student registering into a course in the middle of the afternoon wouldn't have a Moodle account created until sometime around 3:00am, the next morning.

This automated process only works for students who obtained a NEW VCC student number as of November, 2011*. Any accounts which existed before that time do not have a Moodle account created for them. To create the account, students must log in to Moodle (through myVCC, Online Courses) for the first time. That process creates the Moodle account which can then be manually enrolled into a course.

Note that there are some situations where the automated system may not have worked as expected. In that case, the same solution as mentioned in the previous paragraph applies.

]]>If you're new to Moodle, here's what we recommend. Actually, even if you've been using Moodle for a while, we still recommend you review this!

Once you're able to log in to Moodle, enrol yourself in the Online Learner Success Express (OLSE) course. (No enrolment key required) This course is more for students but will give you a good idea of how things work and what your students will see and experience. You can either browse through the course quickly or take the time to do all of the activities.

Browse through the structure of the course to get an idea of what you will learn.

Check out the VCC Moodle Resources for Faculty (MR4F) shell (also accessible via your My Courses link within Moodle) for all the various resources available to you, including the Moodle Tips & Tricks forum. We encourage you to subscribe to that forum, to be notified whenever there's a new post.

As soon as you have the time, work through Moodle in an Hour (or Two) at your own pace. Use the course as a resource anytime you need to look back at a specific topic.

Self-enrolment

Students can “self-enrol” themselves in a course using a unique one-time password called an enrolment key. This key is usually reset by the instructor before a course begins for a new term. For more information on setting or changing the enrolment key, check this knowledgebase article. You can download a template of instructions you can send your students.

Banner/Moodle auto-enrolment

Enrolling students using the Banner/Moodle auto-enrolment is the most efficient way of populating a course with active students. Currently, only those with a Manager role are permitted to set up a course for auto-enrolment. To use the auto-enrolment feature, you must know the BANNER Term code (e.g., 201440) and the CRN (e.g. 40123). The two, together, make up the Course ID for Banner/Moodle auto-enrollment: 20144040123. For more information on Banner/Moodle auto-enrolment, check this knowledgebase article. (Note: Auto enrol only enrols in a course that has a start date (in BANNER) of 5 days into the future or past. In other words, there is an 11 day window in which the auto enrol script will enrol students into a course shell.)

Cohort enrolment

Some departments use cohort enrolment to enrol an entire intake of students into several courses within a program or program level, at one time. To add any student to all courses, simply add them to the appropriate cohort. To remove them, from the course, remove them from the cohort. This method is not appropriate for insert students or courses that are not part of a program. For more information on Cohort Enrolment, check this knowledgebase article.

Note: Note: This KB article is linked to the OTS Course.

]]>So, what is this "Moodle" program anyway, and what can I do with it?

Good questions! Everyone starts somewhere, and so we'll try to give you some background on what Moodle is and how and why you should use it at VCC.

Vancouver Community College’s LMS (Learning Management System) is called Moodle. The name "Moodle" is an acronym for Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment. Moodle is free, open software managed by Moodle HQ.

But, what is this thing called Moodle?

Moodle at Vancouver Community College

At Vancouver Community College, Moodle is used for everything from simply storing course resources to delivering “mixed mode” or 100% online courses.

VCC's Moodle systems are maintained and supported by the DL Support team, under the Centre for Instructional Development. DL Support provides Moodle training and technical support for all VCC Faculty and Staff.

At VCC, Faculty assist their students with any issues encountered in their Moodle course, and DL Support assists Faculty with troubleshooting any issues. DL Support also provides training in Moodle content authoring and course administration. Basically, at VCC, Faculty helps Students in their online learning, and DL Support helps Faculty.

]]>If you are trying to find and enroll a VCC employee or Student into a Moodle course, and cannot find the account, the problem may be that he or she has never logged into Moodle before.

In order for a new VCC employee account to be generated in Moodle, the employee must have logged into Moodle at least once, using the myVCC Online Courses link. This issue also exists with students who were previously in enrolled at VCC prior to November, 2011, but have never logged into Moodle.

How to fix this issue:The solution is the same: Just ask the user to log into myVCC, click on Online Courses, then login to Moodle's home page. Ask him/her to let you know when he/she has done so. At that point, try enroling him/her again. You should be able to find the account. If not, submit a ticket to DL Support, letting us know that you've already tried this and it didn't work.

]]>DLSupport will not grant access to a course shell belonging to another faculty member, without proper permission.

If you require "Teacher" access an existing course shell, please do one of the following:

Ask anyone who is currently enrolled in that course with "Teacher" access to enrol you using these instructions.

]]>There are several ways for you, as an instructor, to get help with Moodle. Download and view this PDF document, called "Getting Help in Moodle (for Faculty)."]]>NOTE: Not everyone has the access rights to copy a course. Generally, this access is granted only to those in an Administrator or Manager role. If you are an instructor, needing a copy of a course, please start here and follow the links.

If you have the access to copy a course, follow these instructions:

From the first page of the course you want to copy, click on "Restore."

Under the "Automated backups" area of the page, locate the latest backup and click on the "Restore" link at the far right.

Scroll down to the very bottom (Hint: With Windows, Ctrl+End will take you to the bottom, quickly.)

Click on [Continue]

Under the area "Restore as a new course," select your department area. If you don't see it, type a part of the name in the Search field to locate it and then select it.

Click on the [Continue] LOCATED AT THE BOTTOM OF THE RESTORE AS A NEW COURSE SECTION.

UNCHECK the "Include enrolled users" check box.

Click on the [Next] button.

Under the "Course Settings" area, change the Course name (Please start with the Subject code and course number, followed by the official course name from the Program Content Guide.)

Change the Course short name to the Subject code and course number.

Change the course start date. IMPORTANT NOTE: If you are not removing the users, for some reason, DO NOT change the date.

Scroll to the bottom and click on the [Next] button.

Scroll to the bottom and click on the [Perform restore] button.

Wait for the restore to complete. This can take several minutes, depending on how many resources and activities you have in the original course shell. When it's competed, click on [Continue].

You will now be directed to the main page of the new course shell. You may need to change the visibility and enrolment key.

]]>If your students are reporting that they cannot see your course, it may still be in a hidden state. You must change the "Visible" setting (under the course settings) from "hide" to "show."

1) From within your course, click on "Edit settings," under the Administration block. 2) On the Edit course settings page, under the General category, look for and change the "Visible" setting. 3) Save your changes.

More Information

This visibility setting of a course determines whether it appears in the list of courses or not. If a course is "hidden" it appears only to users who are enrolled as Teachers in that course, as well as Moodle administrators. Students or other "Teachers" will not see the course listed anywhere.

To tell if your course is currently hidden or visible to students (with the Essential theme) hover over the "My Courses" drop-down menu. Hidden courses will appear with a grey eye icon and grey font. Visible courses will appear with a graduation cap and coloured text. If you have many courses, you may have to scroll to find the course you are looking for.

If you're using Moodle's built-in "Clean" theme, then you can tell by looking at the breadcrumbs at the top of your course page. The part of the breadcrumb showing your course name will be grey if it's hidden and coloured if it's visible.

]]>If yours students are reporting that they cannot see the final grade in their User report, you need to make a change in the Course Grade Setting.

From with your course,

Click on "Grades" in the Administration block

Click on "Course grade settings" the Administration block

On the Course settings page, click on the "Expand all" link, located on the far right, to change it to "Collapse all."

Scroll down the page to the "User report" section.

Change the "Hide totals if they contain hidden items" to one of the "show" options. Which one depends on what you want and how your particular course is set up and administered.

]]>A Subscription to a forum results in notifications being sent to a user when there are responses posted to that forum. These notifications in one of three ways:

As individual notifications (one notification for every post)

As a daily digest (only one notification sent every day which contains all of the posts)

As a daily digest with just subjects (only one notification sent every day, containing only the subject heading and not the content of the posts)

These options are found and changed under any user's profile settings.

As a teacher in a course shell, you're automatically subscribed to any forum you add to your course shell, but you can choose to unsubscribe by clicking on the "Unsubscribe me from this forum," in the settings block.

Whether or not a student is subscribed depends on the settings of a particular forum.

There are 4 subscription mode options in a forum's settings:

Optional subscription - Participants can choose whether to be subscribed

Forced subscription - Everyone is subscribed and cannot unsubscribe

Auto subscription - Everyone is subscribed initially but can choose to unsubscribe at any time

Subscription disabled - Subscriptions are not allowed.

If you want to be sure announcements reach all students, then you should have that forum set to forced subscription. However, this only takes effect with new students added AFTER the setting has been set to FORCED and not students who are already enrolled in a course.

]]>Backing up and Resetting your Course

To reuse an existing course shell, BACKUP and then RESET the course as shown below.

First, BACKUP the existing course:

From the main page of the course, click on “Backups” under the Administration Block

Leave all settings as they are. Scroll down and click on [Next].

Scroll down, again, and click on [Next], again.

Scroll down, again, and click on [Perform Backup], again.

WAIT, patiently, while the backup is processed. This can take several minutes, depending on the number and size of video, sound and image files you have in the course.

The next screen will show “The backup file was successfully created.” Click on [Continue].

You should now see a copy of your course in the form of a “.mbz” file, in the Course backup area. Check the day, date and time under the “Time” column to confirm that it’s there. If not, try the process again, or contact DL Support at DLSupport@vcc.ca or local 8764.

Now, to keep an offline “archive” of the course, single-click on the “Download” link, located to the right of the file, to download to your computer or other storage location such as your department’s local drive.

Then, RESET the course

Resetting allows you to empty a course of user data, while retaining the activities and other settings. Please be warned that by following the steps below you will delete your chosen user data from the course forever! This is why you should make a backup, first! (See above for steps to backup a course.)

From the main page of the course, click on “Reset” under the Administration Block.

At the bottom of the page, click on the [Select default] button. <------- IMPORTANT!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Look over the options to decide if there are any default settings you’d like to change. In most cases, the default should be fine.

Scroll to the bottom and click on [Reset course].

The next screen will show the status of the reset. Look it over for anything unusual. If you see anything questionable, make a note of it and contact DL Support at DLSupport@vcc.ca or local 8761. Otherwise, if it looks OK, click on [Continue]. This will return you to the main course page, where you can now continue to work with the reset course.

]]>There are several ways. both self-paced and scheduled, that can help you learn more about using Moodle at VCC.

Scheduled

One-on-One appointments with a CID staff member (Contact DLSupport@vcc.ca, detailing your needs, to request an appointment)

]]>Please fill out our web form for this so that your shell request will be recorded and handled correctly. You can easily access the shell from the Quick Links block, found in the left margin of this page.

This web form gives you all the information you need to decide what kind of course shell you need, what it will be called, and who should be granted Teacher rights to manage it in Moodle.

Once your form submission has been received, DL Support will act on it and send you an email confirmation with all the details you need to access your new course shell.

Tags: request new moodle course shell course ask get

]]>The Centre for Instructional Development maintains its own FAQs, dealing with common questions from VCC faculty and staff who use Moodle to manage online courses.